Cutting the "Edge": Ann Arbor experimental jazz festival returns for its 27th year

MUSIC PREVIEW

Edgefest 2023 banner

Excerpted from "Things to Do: Fall Festivals Spotlight Arts, Culture, and Music in Washtenaw County" [Pulp, August 31, 2023]

Edgefest
October 18-21
Kerrytown Concert House, Ann Arbor

Edgefest returns to Ann Arbor for its 27th year to celebrate all kinds of exploratory jazz and improvisation. The festival features a roster of local and international artists performing at Kerrytown Concert House as well as the everybody-is-invited-to-play Edgefest Parade in the Farmer's Market area and a massive closing-night concert at Bethlehem UCC featuring Tim Berne’s Oceans AndThe Forest Percussion Ensemble, and the Michael Malis Ensemble premiering a new composition written specifically for Edgefest 2023.

Other highlights include Ann Arborites Tim Haldeman and Jesse Kramer paying tribute to the late Barbara Kramer, a longtime supporter of local artists and Jesse’s mother, on October 18; Dave Rempis/Joshua Abrams/Tomeka Reid trio on October 19; the Luke Stewart Exposure Quintet, Jason Kao Hwang’s Human Rites Trio, and Alexander Hawkins/Joe McPhee/Tomeka Reid trio, and James B. Lewis/Chad Taylor duo on October 20; the Kaleigh Wilder and Ben Hall quartet with Jaribu Shahid and Ken Vandermark as well as the Tomeka Reid-led Hemphill Stringtet on October 21 honoring the music of Julius Hemphill.

Listen to music from some of the artists at this year's Edgefest:

Until Now: Bill Edwards Shares Personal Tales of Life and Love on "So Far" Album

MUSIC INTERVIEW

Bill Edwards leans against a brick wall wearing a navy blue T-shirt and blue jeans.

Bill Edwards reflects on a life filled with optimism, love, gratitude, loss, and wisdom on So Far. Photo by Chasing Light Photos.

As an accomplished songwriter, Bill Edwards often tells stories from multiple perspectives across an astonishing catalog of songs.

This time, the prolific Ann Arbor singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist opted to share his own stories on his new Americana album, So Far.

“The songs are all, without exception, autobiographical, making this the most personal record I’ve ever released. I’ve reached an age where it seemed like it was time to look both backward and forward,” Edwards said.

“The future is never guaranteed, and I wanted some of these feelings captured. There’s a lot of emotional territory covered on the album, and it all feels true to me.”

On So Far, Edwards features 14 tracks that collectively reflect on a life filled with optimism, love, gratitude, loss, wisdom, and nostalgia. The album’s honest sentiment, introspective lyrics, and earnest instrumentation invite listeners to contemplate their own lives alongside Edwards.

“I wrote probably 50 songs that may have been candidates for this record over the past year or so,” he said. “I’m always writing, and these tunes got swapped in and out as new material came to be.”

I recently spoke with Edwards about opening for Rodney Crowell, writing tracks for So Far, recording his new album, hosting an October 18 album release show at The Ark, and working on new material.

Creative Visions: Theater set designer Jungah Han conjures new worlds from scratch

THEATER & DANCE INTERVIEW

Jungah Han headshot

Photo courtesy of Jungah Han.

Jungah Han doesn’t try to copy a successful look from a previous production of a play, musical, or opera she is designing. She doesn’t look at photos or read about what other designers have done, and she tells her University of Michigan students to begin without preconceptions, too.

At times—more often when she’s designing in the United States than abroad—she’s been asked to reproduce what’s been done in other productions.

She’s not interested in those jobs.  

Han, who joined the faculty at the U-M School of Music, Theatre, and Dance last fall, is a theater artist. She brings her own response to a play, in collaboration with the director’s vision and those of others on the design team.  

Yet, Han didn’t even know what theater was when she enrolled in Kangwon National University in her native South Korea. There, she studied business. “Part of business is marketing and advertising. I was interested in the design part,” recalls Han, who moved to Honolulu to study desktop publishing at Hawaii Pacific University. 

Then, a tidal change.

Near, Far, Antics Wherever They Are: Jeff Daniels’ "Diva Royale" keeps the laughs flowing at the Purple Rose Theatre

THEATER & DANCE REVIEW

Kate Thomsen, Rhiannon Ragland, and Kristin Shields in Purple Rose's Diva Royale

Kate Thomsen, Rhiannon Ragland, and Kristin Shields star in Purple Rose's Diva Royale. Photo by Sean Carter Photography.

Jeff Daniels’ funny, silly, and embraceable comedy Diva Royale is—as the program announces—back by public demand at his Purple Rose Theatre in Chelsea.

Three stay-at-home Michigan moms form a close bond with their devotion to Canadian diva Celine Dion and their discontent with home life. Dion is their anchor. They have all the albums, they know all the words to all the songs, they know the heartaches she’s endured and they also love (love, love, love) the movie Titanic, where Dion’s soaring voice gives lift to the love affair of poor Jack and well-to-do Rose.

When they discover that their goddess will be performing in the Big Apple, they are ready to set out on the adventure of a lifetime. As they tell us these events happened in 2019 BC—before covid.

The play is told in a fast-paced, frenetic style that keeps the jokes, the antics, and occasionally, the stinging truth at a high pitch. If one joke fails to amuse you, the next one will have you howling, as the audience was throughout the play at the press opening.

Friday Five: Justin Walter, fling ii, counter magic, The City Lines, Nightkin

MUSIC FRIDAY FIVE

Cover art for the albums and singles featured in the Friday Five.

Friday Five highlights music by Washtenaw County-associated artists and labels.

This week features evocative electronics by Justin Walter, modular synth miniatures by fling ii, indie rock by counter magic and The City Lines, and blackened death metal by Nightkin.

The Mating Game: Ann Arbor Civic Theatre's "The Matchmaker" Tells a Deeper Story Beyond "Hello, Dolly!"

THEATER & DANCE PREVIEW INTERVIEW

Charles Sutherland plays Horace Vandergelder and Julie Post plays Dolly Gallagher Levi in "The Matchmaker" at Ann Arbor Civic Theatre.

Charles Sutherland and Julie Post perform as Horace Vandergelder and Dolly Gallagher Levi in The Matchmaker at Ann Arbor Civic Theatre. Photo taken from Ann Arbor Civic Theatre's Facebook page.

In 1955, playwright Thornton Wilder’s The Matchmaker became a Broadway hit that ran for 486 performances, toured successfully, became a movie, and was embraced by regional and community theaters across the country. Today, Wilder’s play is rarely performed because of Hello Dolly!

“It’s an American classic and it doesn’t get done because Hello, Dolly! gets done,” said Wendy Wright, the director of the Ann Arbor Civic Theatre’s production of The Matchmaker, which will run October 19-22 at the Arthur Miller Theatre.

Hello, Dolly! is, of course, the hit musical adaptation of Thornton Wilder’s play with music and lyrics by Jerry Herman. The song "Hello, Dolly!" was a mega-hit for Louis Armstrong before the musical was up and running, and the musical gave Carol Channing her greatest role. It, too, became a movie with Barbra Streisand and Walter Matthau.

The Matchmaker has an interesting history. It began as a one-act play in England in 1835 and was expanded into a full-length play by an Austrian playwright in 1842. In 1938, Wilder, a three-time Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and novelist, created an American version of the story that he called The Merchant of Yonkers. It flopped. But Wilder regrouped, put the focus on Dolly, and created The Matchmaker. He won the Pulitzer for the plays, Our Town and The Skin of Our Teeth, and the novella, The Bridge of San Luis Rey.

Purple-Colored Glasses: Sarah Costello and Kayla Kaszyca Provide Asexual and Aromantic Perspectives in “Sounds Fake But Okay”

WRITTEN WORD INTERVIEW

The cover of Sounds Fake But Okay and authors Sarah Costello on the top right and Kayla Kaszyca on the bottom right.

Sarah Costello (top right) and Kayla Kaszyca explore asexuality and aromanticism in their new book, Sounds Fake But Okay.

University of Michigan alums Sarah Costello and Kayla Kaszyca host the podcast “Sounds Fake But Okay” and recently came out with their new nonfiction book, Sounds Fake But Okay: An Asexual and Aromantic Perspective on Love, Relationships, Sex, and Pretty Much Anything Else. The book delves into what it means to be asexual and aromatic. Along the way, they define many terms, both in the glossary at the start of the book and in subsequent chapters. They offer their own personal examples and quotations about identities from other people who responded to a survey. 

Like many things, asexuality and aromanticism are on a spectrum, referred to in the book as aspectrum or aspec. Costello and Kaszyca describe their understanding of this range of perspectives and identities as having “purple-colored glasses”:

Once a person first puts on those purple-colored glasses and sees the potential a new mindset unleashes, it’s understandable that they may not want to take them off. It’s understandable that one may choose to embrace the unknown and the uncategorizable in contexts beyond relationships with one another and apply what the aspec lens teaches us to their relationship with themselves.

The authors emphasize the many variations along the aspectrum, given that “the aspectrum is a seemingly infinite trove of words and concepts and love whose combined meaning cannot possibly be fully mastered by a single mortal being.” Aspectrum is not one-size-fits-all but rather a plethora of individualities to which a person may relate. 

David Lawrence Morse's Short Story Collection, "The Book of Disbelieving," Challenges Distinctions Between Fantasy and Reality

WRITTEN WORD INTERVIEW

The cover of "The Book of Disbelieving" along with a photo of David Lawrence Morse.

Sea creatures, time, mating, life, and death all take a twist under David Lawrence Morse’s pen in his new short story collection, The Book of Disbelieving

The worlds of Morse’s short stories are not our worlds, though they are not too different. In The Book of Disbelieving, he changes an element or two of life, which becomes the premise of the story. As one character reflects, “The mind can imagine anything, but that doesn’t make it so.” The stories also read like fables with a moral, even though there are no animals who speak. 

The first story, “The Great Fish,” contains a civilization that lives on the back of a large fish and only allows pairs of people to stay together if they successfully procreate. When Osa and the narrator, who are partners, disagree about their future, Osa focuses on her own plans. Her significant other reflects on their circumstances: “ ‘What’s wrong with floating,’ I asked. ‘That’s the way the world works.’ ” Osa does not want to float through existence anymore, though. They do not agree because her mate wants to keep “the precarious life it was my responsibility to preserve.” As they forge their own paths, the surprising thing is what they miss. 

These stories gravitate to the topic of death. One story covers a person with the role of “oarsman” to row away the deceased. Another story called “The Serial Endpointing of Daniel Wheal” follows a desperate character trapped in a society that has a special unit to remove those who have “endpointed.” Passing on carries a great deal of mystery and abruptness, as Daniel reflects on his life: 

That was memory. That was past. And Charlotte was past and the past is past. As much as he wanted to relish the experience, he couldn’t hold on to the moment, the moments slipped free too quickly, before he could appreciate them the moments ghosted into memory. Time is an endpoint that renders pleasure into grasping after nostalgia. 

No one, including Daniel, is immune. Morse’s stories embrace “how it could all change in an instant. How you told yourself one thing but believed something else. But the thing you actually believed wasn’t the thing you wanted to believe.” 

Morse earned a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) at the University of Michigan and now directs the writing program at the Jackson School of Global Affairs at Yale University. I interviewed him about his new book. 

Deep in the Woods: "The Man Beast" is haunted, moody, and anxious

THEATER & DANCE REVIEW

Jonathan Davidson and Virginie Allard in Penny Seats' The Man Beast.

Jonathan Davidson plays the haunted Jean Chastel in Penny Seats' The Man Beast. Photo via The Penny Seats' Facebook.

’Tis the season for witches and werewolves.

Also—if the Penny Seats Theatre Company’s production of Joseph Zettelmaier’s The Man Beast is any indication—taxidermy, folklore, French accents, and skullduggery.

Set in 1767 France, The Man Beast unfolds in the secluded home of healer and taxidermist Virginie Allard (Brittany Batell), who’s all too aware of her local reputation as “the witch of the woods.” When fellow outcast Jean Chastel (Jonathan Davidson), injured while hunting a legendarily lethal wild beast, barrels his way into the widow’s workshop, Virginie tends to his wounds, and the two form an uneasy alliance.

Yes, the two become lovers, but they also hatch a plan to collect King Louis XVI’s generous bounty for the beast. Jean notes that there have been no deaths in the nearby village since his run-in with it, so, his argument goes, he may well have succeeded in killing the creature. In the absence of more tangible proof, though, he must travel to a far-off menagerie to procure the carcass of a wild, exotic animal, then bring it back to Virginie to prepare it for a dramatic presentation at court.

The pair’s plot succeeds, but as we all know, money can’t buy happiness, and the bond between the two starts to fray.

Close Bond: Eric Moore Searches for Fellowship and Connection on New “Brother” EP

MUSIC INTERVIEW

Eric Moore stands crossing his arms wearing a blue denim jacket and a red-striped shirt.

Eric Moore explores the power of human emotion and connection on Brother. Photo by Jordan Buzzy Photography.

Despite having grown up with an older sister, Eric Moore longs for a strong sense of brotherhood.

The Ypsilanti singer-songwriter/guitarist shares his quest for finding fellowship on “Brother,” the title track from his new blues-rock EP.

“It happened in San Francisco, in Jackson Hole, [Wyoming], and here in Michigan,” said Moore, who grew up near Pittsburgh, and lived out west before moving to Ypsilanti in 2002.

“I made super-tight friendships with some guys who had tight friendships with their brothers. When their brothers were on the scene and whenever we were all together, I felt like the third wheel … there was a line I couldn’t cross, and they weren’t trying to ostracize me by any means, but I just could not get over and get any closer than what those guys had.”

Backed by contemplative acoustic guitar and piano on “Brother,” Moore sings, “The first time I ever heard it I was almost 40 years old / Far past the pain of adolescence, yeah, all those tears were cold / Still it got me thinking about some good friends along the way / They were always there for each other, there wasn’t nothing left to say.”

“I noticed this tendency in me to do that, so I started with this line, ‘I’ve been waiting on you, brother.’ I tried writing around that, and I was trying to force something,” he said.

“Somewhere at some point, I said … ‘Nobody ever called me brother,’ and I went, ‘Boom! That is the song and the line that everything is going to hinge on.’ And then the song just wrote itself, it just poured out after I had that line … [and] that’s the truth, too, growing up in Washington, Pennsylvania without a musical soul to even talk with.”